French politicians reacted with anger and dismay after the tomb of France's wartime hero and former president General Charles de Gaulle was vandalised.

Police are hunting for two people, one of whom was filmed on Saturday by security cameras knocking a cross off the top of the tomb in Colombey-les-Deux-Eglises, the village in eastern France where Gen De Gaulle lived and is buried.

President Emmanuel Macron, in a statement on Sunday from his office, asked that the tomb be quickly repaired, adding Gen De Gaulle's memory is "dear to all French people".

Prime minister Edouard Philippe tweeted his "sadness and consternation" and called the vandalism "an act against France".